- Says Obasanjo assembled most competent economic team
The Serving Overseer of the Latter Rain Assembly (LRA), Pastor Tunde Bakare has raised the alarm that Nigeria was on another collision course, stressing that he worked with former President Goodluck Jonathan and President Muhammadu Buhari to ensure that the country did not disintegrate in 2015.
He also declared that the economic team assembled by former President Olusegun Obasanjo was arguably the most competent ever assembled by any government in Nigeria’s history till date, adding that credit must be given to Obasanjo for assembling that team.
Speaking in Glasgow, UK, to the African forum Scotland and the Association of Nigerians in Scotland, the fiery preacher cautioned that Nigeria was on a collision course again as the 2019 elections draw near.
“Unknown to many observers, in 2015, following the lifting of the embargo, I worked closely behind the scenes with the two leading candidates in the presidential elections at the time, then President Goodluck Jonathan of the PDP and General Muhammadu Buhari of the APC, towards ensuring that the election results were upheld and that the transition was smooth,” he said.
“I saw at close quarters how the fate of a nation could hang on a single decision. Therefore, believe me when I tell you that we escaped disintegration by the whiskers.
“Now, four years after that escape, our nation is once again headed on a collision course with probable instability unless the tense atmosphere associated with our four-year electocratic insanity is managed with utmost wisdom.
“Once again, I have found myself in the inner workings of the chaotic political process and I can tell you that we live in precarious times. How long can our nation stand if we continue along this path? Is it not time to address the foundations once and for all?
“What, then, is the way forward and what is the role of the diaspora? Answers to these questions will constitute the concluding aspects of this address,” Bakare said, according to The Cable.
He told the Nigerians in the diaspora to observe what he called the Nehemiah model in fixing Nigeria, and the rest of Africa. Bakare shared his Distinct Nationhood Agenda (DNA) and his political family, which “is propelled by one agenda – Restructuring for a United Nigeria (RUN)”.
Bakare added that former president Olusegun Obasanjo assembled arguably the most competent team by any government in Nigeria’s history till date but left a lame, limping legacy.
He said Obasanjo could have given priority to this team rather than hand Nigeria over to a legacy of lame and limping successor governments that first sunk Nigeria into a constitutional crisis.
“Between May 1999 and March 2007, Nigeria’s external reserves compounded from 4.98 billion dollars to 59.37 billion dollars,” he said.
“Aside opportunistic factors such as the oil windfall, these results were the outcome of astute economic management by an economic team comprised of the likes of Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Dr. Oby Ezekwesili, Dr. Charles Chukwuma Soludo and Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, among others.
“That economic team was arguably the most competent ever assembled by any government in Nigeria’s history till date. Credit must be given to Chief Olusegun Obasanjo for assembling that team.”
“One would have thought that this brilliant team that oversaw the Nigerian dimension of ‘Africa Rising’ would be given priority in the succession plan of then President Olusegun Obasanjo.
“Instead, after a botched third term agenda, the Obasanjo administration bequeathed to Nigeria a legacy of lame and limping successor governments that first sunk Nigeria into a constitutional crisis and then oversaw the plundering of the nation’s wealth in a free-for-all corruption jamboree.”
Bakare, who visited the Australian and the Scottish Parliament, was also awarded a fellowship of African Centre for Research, Policy and Development, UK.
